


Like a Kid in a Candy Store

by nagi_schwarz



Series: Number The Stars [1]
Category: Numb3rs, Stargate Atlantis, Thoughtcrimes (2003)
Genre: Crossover, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-21
Updated: 2016-02-21
Packaged: 2018-05-27 17:08:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,550
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6292744
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nagi_schwarz/pseuds/nagi_schwarz
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Elizabeth didn't know what to make of the chopper pilot who ran supplies and personnel across the ice. And then he sat in the Chair. For this <a class="i-ljuser-profile" href="http://comment-fic.livejournal.com/profile"><img class="i-ljuser-userhead"/></a><a class="i-ljuser-username" href="http://comment-fic.livejournal.com/">comment_fic</a> prompt: "Stargate Atlantis/Numb3rs/Thoughtcrimes fusion, John Sheppard|Brendan Dean + Amita Ramanujan|Freya McAllister, when Sheppard went to Atlantis he brought with him his (former?) NSA/FBI partner."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Like a Kid in a Candy Store

Elizabeth didn't know what to make of the chopper pilot who ran supplies and personnel across the ice. Major John Sheppard had non-regulation hair and elfin ears and a decidedly insouciant smirk, and while no one had any complaints about him, no one really knew him. He kept to himself, and he kept to his best friend, Amita Ramanujan, who was a civilian and a mathematician helping Rodney McKay with the Ancient control chair. Elizabeth had watched Sheppard and Amita together ever since she'd arrived at McMurdo. When he wasn't flying and she wasn't working with the scientists – he didn't have clearance for the Stargate program – he stuck to her like white on rice. Amita had somehow patched into the security feed on the base and kept tabs on Sheppard all day. He must have known about it, because every now and again he'd look directly up at one of the cameras and smile. And he checked in with her multiple times a day. Even though the scientists had their own commissary so they didn't have to constantly venture into unsecured areas for sustenance, Sheppard came to the security gate at least three times a day with a delivery of coffee and snacks. Since he was always polite enough to bring extras for Amita to share with whichever colleagues were nearby when he made such a delivery, Elizabeth knew that wherever he got his coffee, it was better than anything they had access to.

Amita made sure to eat every meal with John. Sometimes others would sit with them, but more often than not it was just the two of them, talking in low voices, smiling and laughing, sharing old stories. Sheppard was a good-looking man, and Elizabeth had heard more than one person on base speculating about his relationship status, what he might be like in bed (though she'd never joined in such speculation herself). Amita was a beautiful woman, and initially Elizabeth thought they might be dating – which wouldn't violate any fraternization regs Sheppard was subject to – but she didn't think they were. They were comfortable in each other's space, had a way of moving with each other and responding to each other without needing to resort to words, but Elizabeth didn't sense the spark of attraction between them. Fondness, definitely, but no romance. Sheppard was a little protective of Amita, and Amita was often exasperated of him. Like a big brother and a little sister, though they weren't related, best as Elizabeth could tell. She wondered how long they'd known each other. Were they old friends? Maybe ex-lovers who'd managed to remain friends.

No. Sheppard's comfort in Amita's space never spoke of that kind of old intimacy.

And then it happened. Rodney bullied Carson into the chair while Amita tried to talk him out of it, because a nervous man trying to activate the Ancient weapons platform was recipe for disaster. Carson accidentally fired a drone. The drone almost took down the chopper General O'Neill was in. In the ensuing panic, no one realized that O'Neill had let Sheppard past the security barrier, and he was left milling there, scanning his surroundings interestedly.

"John!" Amita cried. "What are you doing here?"

"The general let me in," he said. "I guess now I have clearance or something."

"That's not how it works," Amita said. "You have to sign a ton of paperwork. Let me ask the general –

Carson stormed past. "I'm never doing that again. You can't make me."

Rodney hurried after him. "Beckett, come on now, you have the strongest –"

"I said no," Carson snapped.

"Hey," Sheppard said, and Carson came up short, disarmed by his easy grin. "Looks like I kinda landed in the wrong spot. Can anyone tell me what's going on? And why my chopper was almost taken down by a glowing squid?"

Carson's eyes went wide. "I'm so sorry! I didn't mean to do that."

Sheppard raised his eyebrows. "That was you?"

"It was an accident. It'll never happen again, I swear," Carson said, "because I'm never going near that damn chair again."

Sheppard's eyes lit up, and he cast Amita a triumphant look. "What chair?" She rolled her eyes.

Rodney was also brought up short at the sight of Sheppard. "Who're you? I've never seen you before. Have you been tested?"

"Tested for what?" Sheppard backed away, immediately suspicious.

"You're so ungrateful, Rodney," Carson said. "Major Sheppard brings us the good coffee at least twice a day."

"Oh. I wondered where that coffee was coming from," Rodney said, smiling fondly for a moment. He narrowed his eyes at Sheppard. "Do you have clearance to be here?"

"General O'Neill just gave it to me," Sheppard said, and he looked gleeful, excited. If he were a puppy, he'd have been wagging his tail and darting all over the place, investigating everything.

Elizabeth was ready to step in and defuse a complication if necessary, but Amita tugged on Sheppard's arm.

"Come on, let's get your paperwork signed," she said. He allowed her to drag him away. Rodney followed, curious.

Elizabeth followed as well, because she wanted to assist Rodney in reading Sheppard into the Stargate program, as Rodney would no doubt attempt to do so with too much information and too little finesse. They were halfway to Amita's office when they passed the room with the control chair, and General O'Neill was in there, talking to Zelenka.

"Sir," Sheppard began.

O'Neill spun around. "Ah. There you are. Wait here. Don't touch anything."

Amita blinked. "I was on my way to have him sign the –"

"Wait here," O'Neill said again, and put enough of a command into his tone that Amita dropped her grip on Sheppard's sleeve.

As soon as O'Neill was out of the room, Sheppard prowled closer to the chair. "What's this? Is this what that Scottish guy used to shoot glowy squids at me?"

"It's an Ancient control chair," Rodney said, "and yes, it was how Carson was able to release a drone."

"Doesn't look very Ancient to me." Sheppard circled the chair, eyes alight like a kid in a candy store. He shot Amita a look, waggled his eyebrows, and she rolled her eyes again, but she was smiling, amused by his fascination. Something unspoken passed between them that only they understood.

"Ancient like the race of people who used to live here," Rodney said. "And, well, yes, also in physical age, but – shouldn't you know who the Ancients are?"

"Doesn't look very comfortable, either, but you can't judge a book by its cover." And Sheppard was hopping into the chair before anyone else could blink.

Zelenka and Rodney cried out in horror, but Amita just sighed and said, “Not again.”

And then the chair was turning on and sinking back with Sheppard in it, and it was glowing blue and active and Sheppard said, "What's going on?"

The horror on Rodney's face turned into glee. "You must have the gene! Think about where we are in the universe."

A hologram appeared in the air above Sheppard's head, shifted like it was scanning, and there, a three-dimensional golden star chart was showing right where earth was. "Did I do that?" Sheppard asked. "And what gene?"

"The ATA gene," Rodney said. Sheppard cast Amita a look, and she said,

"The Ancient Technology Activation gene. It allows people to initialize and utilize Ancient tech. Few humans have it. No one has it as strong as you."

"Am I part Ancient then?" Sheppard asked. "Because even though my dad was a really weird guy, I'm pretty sure I'm all human."

"It's a long story," Amita began.

Rodney cut in. "Are you certified for gate travel?"

"Gate travel?" Sheppard echoed.

Amita sighed. "McKay, he just barely got clearance to know about any of this stuff."

O'Neill came dashing back into the room, a gaggle of scientists on his heels. "Sheppard," he barked, "I told you not to touch anything."

"Nononono," Rodney said, "let him keep touching things. Look!"

O'Neill's anger came up short when he saw the hologram. "Well, I'll be damned."

"Jack," Elizabeth said gently, "he doesn't even know what stargates are."

Rodney and O'Neill blinked, like they'd just remembered she was in the room. Judging by Sheppard's smirk, he hadn't forgotten her presence once.

"Right," O'Neill said. "Rodney, get him up to speed."

"Actually, sir, why don't you let me do it?" Amita asked.

"After I'm done running some tests," Rodney insisted, but Amita said firmly, "Now, while he signs his NDA."

"That's an excellent idea, Dr. Ramanujan," Elizabeth said. "Why don't I help you?"

"I'd appreciate it, Dr. Weir." Amita smiled and then cast Sheppard a look, and he climbed out of the chair reluctantly. In Amita's office, he filled out the paperwork quickly and efficiently while Amita gave him a brief overview of the Stargate program. Elizabeth knew she'd only joined up in the last couple of years, after Rodney had recruited her from a mathematics grad program at Cal Tech. Elizabeth didn't know the full details of her file but knew that while at Cal Tech she'd worked with the FBI and before that she'd done some work for the NSA. She was a numerical pattern savant, apparently, and for a while her gift had burdened her so much that she'd spent time in a long-term mental health facility, but she had passed her qualifications for gate travel on the first try, unlike many of the scientists in the SGC.

John Sheppard's expression of the ATA gene was quite possibly the strongest in history. Elizabeth needed him for the Atlantis Expedition. She wondered if O'Neill wanted first dibs on him. Now was her chance to talk to him about the expedition.

But Amita was speaking, and Sheppard was asking, thoughtful, insightful questions, and soon enough, Sheppard had a pretty good grasp on the Stargate program and how Ancient tech worked.

"Have you gone to other planets?" Sheppard asked.

Amita shook her head. "Not yet."

"I was about to say," Sheppard said, "if you do that, you have to take me with you."

"I couldn't have. Classified."

"Not for me it isn't, not anymore." Sheppard grinned. "So this is what you've been doing all day while I've been making milk runs."

Amita shoved him in the shoulder. "You love flying and you know it."

"That I do."

Rodney burst into the office. "Are you done with the paperwork already? There are some things I want Major Sheppard to try to initialize."

Amita raised her eyebrows, amused at Rodney’s eagerness, and Sheppard said, "I'm not a human light switch."

"It's imperative for the planet's security," Rodney insisted, and vanished in a whirlwind of stress and high energy.

Sheppard glanced at Amita, who nodded and shrugged to an unspoken question, and then he followed Rodney out of the room. Amita trailed after them, leaving Elizabeth to wonder just how she could convince Sheppard to make a one-way trip to another galaxy with her.

She broached the subject with O'Neill. "I need Sheppard for Atlantis."

"He has a black mark in his record. Disobeyed orders in A-Stan. Almost got himself killed."

"But he's alive," Elizabeth said. "Besides, I've seen _your_ record."

"Sumner's already chosen his soldiers for Atlantis," O'Neill said. "I trust his judgment."

"I wouldn't need Sheppard as a soldier. You could remove him from Sumner's chain of command. I need him for his gene, for the science."

"A soldier without a chain of command is a ticking time bomb. Not to mention he'd be one of the highest-ranking officers on the expedition after Sumner." O"Neil frowned.

"Jack –"

"Ask him if he wants to go. He told me he likes it here."

Elizabeth heard the challenge in O'Neill's voice, his surety of Sheppard's refusal. What did O'Neill know about Sheppard that she didn't? Elizabeth went to check his file.

She found the black mark immediately. His posting at McMurdo was basically a punishment while the higher-ups decided what to do with him. He'd disobeyed orders after a chopper went down in enemy territory. He'd taken another chopper to rescue the survivors. There'd been only one. Amita Ramanujan. Sheppard had risked his life and career to save her, a civilian consultant. How had she managed to get herself posted to the same place as Sheppard after what he'd done? Elizabeth scanned his file further, but up to that point his record was clean, with only a few notes about attitude and borderline insubordination at times. His fellow officers liked him, and his inferior officers and the enlisted men he worked with admired and respected him. He wasn't a poor soldier.

But something about the whole affair felt...off. So Elizabeth fired off an email to one of her civilian friends, a computer analyst at the FBI named Penelope Garcia, and asked her to do some more digging about John Sheppard and Amita Ramanujan.

What Penelope came back with was unsettling. Both of their backgrounds read exactly as Elizabeth had in her files, but there were NSA fingerprints all over everything, and not just Amita's time consulting with them as a mathematician. Best as Penelope could tell, John Sheppard and Amita Ramanujan were real people, and everything Elizabeth had read about them was true, but there was more to them than met the eye, and she had better be careful.

At dinner that night, Sheppard and Amita sat at their usual little table in the corner, heads bent close together, talking. Elizabeth watched them closely, and she realized, Amita was doing most of the talking. Sheppard was eating a whole lot, and nodding, and making frequent eye-contact, but he wasn't saying much of anything. Amita had never struck Elizabeth as an overly chatty person, so she pretended to talk to Zelenka as an excuse to stand near them and do her best to listen.

" – Know I can't go through a gate without you," Amita was saying, "but then you can't go without me either."

Sheppard raised his eyebrows at her.

"I'm not saying you're an incompetent soldier," Amita said, "but you're not my protector anymore either. And I get it, we don't know what risks the gate would pose to me, but this is the opportunity but of a lifetime, and I –"

Sheppard cleared his throat.

Amita cut herself off.

Elizabeth had been made. She thanked Zelenka and hurried on her way.

Later that evening, when most of the scientists had either wandered off to bed or were huddled in the common room playing chess or other games, Elizabeth spotted Amita in her office. She was hunched over, speaking into her cell phone in a low voice. "Yes, sir, I understand. Of course not, sir, I – Yes. Whatever you say, sir." She sighed and hung up the phone, turned to her laptop.

Elizabeth immediately stepped back, out of sight. She heard Amita tap on the keys. How did her cell phone work all the way out here?

"John," Amita said, "you better get over here. We have to talk."

Elizabeth didn't hear a response, but then Sheppard said,

"Dr. Weir. Just the person I was looking for."

She cried out and started violently. Sheppard was standing right behind her, wearing black BDU pants and a black t-shirt. His smile was handsome and disarming, but Elizaebeth was wary. She backed up a step. Sheppard followed her into the lab, and he closed the door behind him.

"Dr. Weir," Amita said, and Elizabeth jumped again. She'd forgotten Amita was there.

"Don't worry," Sheppard said, raising his hands in a gesture of surrender, "we're not going to hurt you."

"There's something we need to tell you," Amita said. "Something classified."

"Everyone here has signed the appropriate NDA's –"

"It's not related to the Stargate program," Amita said. "I only got clearance to tell one person, either you or General O'Neill. But since you want John for the Atlantis Expedition, and he wants to go, we figured we'd tell you."

"Only if you'll actually take us, though," Sheppard said.

Elizabeth looked back and forth between them. "Us?" How did they know she wanted Sheppard for Atlantis? Amita knew about Atlantis. It wasn't a difficult logical leap to make. Or had O’Neill told him, tried to sell him on the SGC on Earth?

"I only go if she goes." Sheppard nodded at Amita.

"Why?"

"Because we're partners," Sheppard said.

Maybe Elizabeth had been wrong about them after all. "If you're romantically involved –"

"Not those kind of partners," Amita said quickly. "Professional. Like...two NSA agents who are partners."

"NSA?" Elizabeth knew she sounded like a parrot, but her mind was spinning. So they were involved in the NSA. Did the SGC know?

"Yes," Amita said. "We work for the NSA."

"You're...spies?"

Sheppard shook his head. "No. But we have been installed here on a permanent basis."

"Then does the NSA know about the SGC?"

"Not as a whole," Amita said. "Just our handler. Look, we didn't plan for this. We didn't know John had the gene. He was just supposed to stay here and protect me. It's what he always does."

"Because I have orders, straight from your little magic phone." Sheppard smirked, and Amita rolled her eyes, like it was an in-joke that was too worn-out to be funny anymore.

"Why are you here?" Elizabeth asked.

"Because we can help," Amita said. "The SGC hasn't had any external Goa'uld incursions in the last six months."

"Because Amita's been with the program," Sheppard added.

"How does she help?"

"I can read minds."

Elizabeth stared at Amita in confusion.

"I'm a telepath," Amita said calmly, patiently.

Elizabeth looked at Sheppard. Was Amita –

"Insane?" Amita asked. "No. I can look at a person and see their thoughts and know immediately if they're Goa'uld or not. I can look at you and hear your thoughts, which is how I know you asked your friend Penelope Garcia about us, and you want John for his gene because the expedition needs someone with his strength of gene expression, and you also think his ears are elfin."

"Hey!" Sheppard protested. He actually clapped his hands over his ears for a moment.

It was Amita's turn to smirk at him.

Elizabeth shook her head. "No, this is impossible, like –"

"Interstellar travel through wormholes? Intergalactic travel? The Lost City of Atlantis?"

"Well, when you put it like that –"

"We're here to help, I promise," Amita said. "Give us a chance to prove it to you."

"Amita's saved my bacon more than once with her talents." Sheppard caught Elizabeth's gaze, held it. He looked utterly sincere. How could she know he was sincere? Could Amita control her thoughts, like –

"Professor X? That's just a comic book. You never struck me as an X-Men fan, Dr. Weir." Amita was smiling now.

Impossible. Or not. There was no other way for Amita to know the thoughts running through Elizabeth's head as she thought them. "How does it work?"

"I look at someone, and I can read their thoughts," Amita said.

Sheppard rolled his eyes. "It's why she stalks me all over the base using the security cameras. Distance is no object so long as she can see the person."

"Don't act like my keeping an eye on you is that irritating," Amita said. "What's irritating is the way you're always singing the Scooby Doo theme in your head."

"You know I do it just to irritate you."

"It works."

They squabbled like a brother and sister. It was hard to listen to them ribbing each other and grinning at each other and think of them as a threat. Elizabeth remembered the way Rodney and Zelenka had become so excited they were practically talking in numbers and formulas as Sheppard lit up object after Ancient object in the lab earlier that day. He was vital to the Atlantis mission. And Amita was a talented mathematician. If Elizabeth had to take both of them, she would.

"All right," she said. "Dr. Amita Ramanujan, Major John Sheppard, will you come to Atlantis?"

"Yes," Sheppard said.

Amita actually let out a little cheer and jumped up and down. "Yes!"

Sheppard rolled his eyes. "You're such a nerd."

"This from the man with the photographic memory who will recite Harry Potter to entertain children."

Sheppard blushed. "Whatever. Thanks for the invite, Dr. Weir. We accept." He yawned. "And now, it's time for me to get my beauty sleep." He turned and left the lab.

If there was one thing Sheppard didn't need, it was beauty sleep. Elizabeth watched him go, admiring, and then she shot Amita a horrified look.

Amita smiled and waved her concern aside. "Don't worry. You're not the only one. I never tell him, if only because his ego doesn't need the inflating."

"So...you can hear everyone's thoughts, all the time?" Elizabeth asked.

Amita shut down here laptop, switched off some of the other machines, and led Elizabeth out of the lab and toward the women's dorms.

"No," Amita said. "That'd drive a person insane. I can choose what I hear, now."

"I can see how that gift would be very useful to the NSA," Elizabeth said. "What makes you think it'll be useful in the Pegasus galaxy?"

"We'll see, won't we?"

Elizabeth nodded. "We will." She was looking forward to it.


End file.
